[Source: Austin E. Penny, Jr., Program Vice President, LISC] -- Teresa Brice has been appointed Director of Phoenix LISC (Local Initiatives Support Corporation). Teresa is a native of Mesa, Arizona and a respected professional in the nonprofit community in the Phoenix metropolitan area. She began her commitment to community advocacy over 25 year ago as an attorney for Community Legal Services assisting neighborhood groups in the Phoenix area to apply for CDBG funds for grassroots projects. It was through her efforts to assist these groups that, in 1988, she became the co-founder of Housing For Mesa, Inc., an affordable housing development corporation and the first of its kind in the city. Over the next seventeen years, she served as Executive Director, member of the Board and Senior Vice President for Housing For Mesa. In her latter capacity she was responsible for program, board and resource development for the organization's offices in Arizona and Nevada, as well as, grant writing, contract compliance , program evaluation, property disposition, housing policy, and advocacy.In 1988, Teresa also help establish the Mesa Association of Hispanic Citizens, a Latino advocacy organization, also the first of its kind in Mesa. In 1998 Teresa was successful in organizing a grassroots campaign to help pass a sales tax to increase funds for Mesa's new Arts Center, and also organized an ad hoc citizens group to participate in the revision of Mesa's General Plan in keeping with Arizona's Growing Smarter legislation. Teresa has been active in shaping public policy on many level in Arizona. She was a member of the Task Force to create Mesa's first General Plan; served on the Regional Workforce Housing Task Force for Mariposa County; a member of the Arizona State Housing Commission; member of the Steering Committee for the Community Development Coalition of Arizona, and member of the national advisory boards of the Enterprise Foundation and JP Morgan Chase bank.
